42: Elvis Costello is adenoidal

Episode 42 was recorded on June 16 and runs about an hour long. We cover the past thirty days or so of all sections of MetaFilter

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Jobs mentioned:
Google Wave Developer

Projects:
Super URL shorteners (also ended up on MeFi)

Flash game version of Starcom (again, also on MeFi)

Can I marry gay? (wow, posted to MeFi as well)

Markov generator for Twitter

Old Postcards

MeFi Music:
Current challenge: Hallelujah covers

Skallelujah which prompted skinny jeans talk which prompted obesity lookups (1, 2)

Ask MeFi questions:
Strange Cookie Recipes

Help me find easy tactical RPGs

Seeking long-term art project for my newborn son

What is the song they always use...? (examples: busy office gets the typewriter song, Civil War movie writing home a letter background music)

How to deal with being mediocre and How to get creative again

Turning 30 and not married yet

MetaFilter links:
Elvis Costello mentions from the NYTimes (plus shibboleths mention)

Awesome hug story from ColdChef

Three Frames

My Milk Toof

Childhood cereal boxes nostalgia gallery

Why can't I find Coke Zero and where to find no caffeine drinks

Cloud appreciation society (phronist's dad won their cloud of the month)

Night sky above Texas (time-lapse)

All about the Milky Way

Some comics about mental illness (related: Ask MeFi post about crazy-seeming websites with melissa may's comment)

Toto: Africa sung by a choir (related: Heat of the moment dot asia)

MeFi Music Collaboration #2

posted by mathowie (staff) to MeFi Podcast at 4:08 PM (46 comments total)

let me be the first one to say: yay, new podcast.
posted by starzero at 4:44 PM on June 18, 2009

MetaFilter: You wound me!
posted by davejay at 5:04 PM on June 18, 2009

I shall be the second to say: yay, new podcast.
posted by Phire at 5:24 PM on June 18, 2009

I'm wondering how many MeFi user's real names we used in this podcast. I count cortex, secretariat, ColdChef and I guess hodgman if you count him.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 5:42 PM on June 18, 2009

Man, I totally missed that opportunity, Phire. Way to go for it.
posted by davejay at 5:54 PM on June 18, 2009

Did No Doubt have anything to do with the downfall of ska?
posted by boo_radley at 6:01 PM on June 18, 2009

Let me be the first to say thank you for pointing me to the 'adenoidal Costello' comment from Combustible Edison Lighthouse, which I had missed. Kudos, CEL, for a spot-on piece of research that so damningly illustrates the fact that music *journalism* (even as practiced by the august, hallowed and noble New York frikkin' Times) is all-too-depressingly-often often just lazy hackery, fit for wrapping tomorrow's fish.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 6:04 PM on June 18, 2009

(running commentary) holistic horse massage is totally the shallow end of equestrian crazy, Jessamyn. I've known a person or two who has dealt with a psychic horse therapist.
posted by boo_radley at 6:05 PM on June 18, 2009

Did No Doubt have anything to do with the downfall of ska?

They probably didn't help any, boo_radley.
posted by cortex (staff) at 6:09 PM on June 18, 2009

Oh, and regarding the adenoidal-obsessed NYT, it's worth noting that the majority of those quotes are from Times old-timer Stephen Holden. But isn't it reassuring (yeah, right) to see that the Noble Traditions of the Gray Lady have been upheld in recent years by insightful thinkers like Neil Strauss (whose "adenoidal" descriptor showed up in three of the examples). Neil is better known now for his appearances on the talk-show circuit, hawking his bestseller book on how to pick up chicks. Way to go, Neil! Adenoids, baby! Roooowwwrrrr!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 6:18 PM on June 18, 2009

Heh. "The Facebook".

Why don't you go watch some moving pictures on the Youtube?
posted by ODiV at 7:11 PM on June 18, 2009

Thanks for including the Exquisite Corpse in the podcast! (And thanks for sidebarring it, as well.)
posted by Karlos the Jackal at 7:48 PM on June 18, 2009

Heh. "The Facebook".

Facebook used to be known as "The Facebook" to avoid address collisions, because http://facebook.fas.harvard.edu points to the Harvard College facebook. The slightly altered name meant you could type "thefacebook" into your address bar and get the site, which was probably valuable for branding.
posted by grobstein at 8:22 PM on June 18, 2009

The music clips from "What's that song they always use" totally make this podcast. Can you guys just intersperse those clips into every podcast from now on? 'Cause it really adds a lot.

I didn't say it in the thread, but the reason "Ashokan Farewell' conjures the Civil War is that Ken Burns took that song, a contemporary composition, and put it in his Civil War documentary. People kinda went nuts for it and Jay Ungar and Molly Mason will probably be enjoying the results for the remainder of their lives. But it was used on every show, and also in every constantly-repeated PBS promo for the show, and now, forever, "Ashokan Farewell" and the American Civil War will be permanently linked in the public mind.
posted by Miko at 9:03 PM on June 18, 2009

Facebook used to be known as "The Facebook" to avoid address collisions

I meant to do that!

oldskool!
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:32 PM on June 18, 2009

Did No Doubt have anything to do with the downfall of ska?

FTFY.
posted by pompomtom at 9:42 PM on June 18, 2009

Podcast #42 is the Ultimate Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything.

Wait. Where's my towel?
posted by wendell at 9:49 PM on June 18, 2009

I like to post "SQUEEEEEEEEEEEE" in podcast threads.
posted by Jofus at 2:02 AM on June 19, 2009

I like how, despite the fact that I live on Metafilter, the podcasts always point me to stuff I missed.
posted by The Whelk at 4:10 AM on June 19, 2009 [1 favorite]

Can we ratchet down the output? I'm still on July '08, and feel a little bit weird reading Metafilter all day, then listening to the podcast constantly during my drive time in a desperate, losing gambit to catch up, so I ration myself to once a week or so in order to not squick myself out.

The good part is I get to remember stuff I've totally forgotten for an entire year.

At least I'm now past the November election on the Common Sense podcast. That feels like real progress.
posted by Devils Rancher at 4:45 AM on June 19, 2009

Did No Doubt have anything to do with the downfall of ska?

It's a shame that these days when anyone thinks of ska they think about third wave (e.g. Reel Big Fish) or stuff that isn't even ska. As opposed to first wave stuff (e.g. Justin Hinds) which is far far superior.
posted by Erberus at 5:18 AM on June 19, 2009

Hey, I'm anyone and juuuuuust old enough to have been into ska as a pre-teen.

So someone says "Ska!" and I think this or this


Upon watching that first video: I now know where my dancing style comes from!
posted by The Whelk at 5:22 AM on June 19, 2009

So someone says "Ska!" and I think this or this

OK, you're a certain age, so you think of that and that. Fortunately, though, recording technology predates that and that, and if you are so inclined, you can look back to a time before your pre-teen years, and listen to the original stuff. Then when you hear someone say "Ska!" you can think of this. Yay!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:33 AM on June 19, 2009

I shall consider myself schooled Mr. Midnight.

marry me?
posted by The Whelk at 5:35 AM on June 19, 2009

hmmm... what kind of dowry are we talkiing, Whelk?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:37 AM on June 19, 2009

all the dried cranberries you can stand
posted by The Whelk at 5:40 AM on June 19, 2009

I'll get back to you...
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:43 AM on June 19, 2009

More old Jamaican music is available for the ears to hear when you stream GENEROSO'S BOVINE SKA AND ROCKSTEADY RADIO SHOW
posted by sleevener at 7:44 AM on June 19, 2009

Then I'm taking The shallow end of equestrian crazy. $1 for a shot of Scope.
posted by boo_radley at 8:54 AM on June 19, 2009

No Doubt is ska-influenced, but I wouldn't call them a ska band. They had nothing to do with any perceived downfall of ska, mostly because there never was such a downfall.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 10:23 AM on June 19, 2009

What I'm trying to say is, about the future of ska I remain mostly upbeat.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 10:25 AM on June 19, 2009 [3 favorites]

Frat ska is dead; ska is forever.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 1:36 PM on June 19, 2009

Woo hoo! Two of my music suggestions from the megamusic thread made it into the podcast!

Also, Afroblanco, please consider me your first groupie.
posted by greekphilosophy at 4:05 PM on June 19, 2009

I dunno, greekphilosophy, Afroblanco might already have a groupie or two...
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:23 PM on June 19, 2009

We can all be each other's groupie and take turns hurling whiskey bottles at each other.
posted by The Whelk at 8:59 PM on June 19, 2009

Cool. Let's just hope that there's plenty of whiskey (and whisky, too) IN the bottles. And, instead of throwing them, we can just pass them around calmly.

And no adenoidal singing, or bringing copies of the New York Times to the party.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 9:25 PM on June 19, 2009

Bud Cort was also the voice of the computer in "Electric Dreams."

Sorry I flaked on the reading of my hug story. I blame my continuing blindness. Thanks for the shout-out anyway. And no one tell Merlin Mann that I'm gay for him. Please.
posted by ColdChef at 10:32 PM on June 19, 2009

Oh! I just met someone who lived in Antarctica for years! What info should I pass along?
posted by Pronoiac at 12:35 AM on June 20, 2009

What were you guys referring to at the very beginning - something you had previously sold, but now wanted to give away at meetups? I couldn't quite catch it.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 12:38 AM on June 20, 2009

And no adenoidal singing

Fine, I'm out.
posted by Karlos the Jackal at 1:30 AM on June 20, 2009

Keeping in mind that the MP3 actually claims Elvis Costello is “adneoidal.”
posted by joeclark at 5:53 AM on June 20, 2009

Bud Cort was also the voice of the computer in "Electric Dreams."

No freaking way. (Also, what the hell?)
posted by steef at 6:30 AM on June 20, 2009

What were you guys referring to at the very beginning - something you had previously sold, but now wanted to give away at meetups? I couldn't quite catch it.

A few years ago, before Music existed in its current form, I organized a Metafilter Compilation Album featuring tracks by a couple dozen folks here. We did pre-orders, came in looking solid for funding a thousand-CD printing, and I had them made up and mailed 'em out to folks. (Here's some condensed history of the project.)

All in all I think we sold between 250 and 300 of 'em, at least half of those pre-orders and most of the rest in the two or three months following the release. Sales are pretty much dead, now; I haven't had more than maybe two orders in the last year and change, and, like I said in the podcast, without any reason to expect them to start up in earnest and start selling by the hundreds again I'm tempted to just decommission the orders page. Doing one-off fulfillment every several months is kind of annoying and also not something my personal slacker-procrastination personality meshes all that well with.

So the remaining several hundred are sitting in my office closet at this point. We were talking about maybe sending boxes of these off to the larger meetups for folks to go ahead and take and then pass around the extras to friends or whatnot. Given that the proceeds for the project all went to charity (The Mockingbird Foundation, to whom I ended up writing a $1700 check a while back, and I should really should at some point find and scan the form-letterish-but-thankful note they wrote back), I feel more okay about giving away the excess than I would about trying to like move it at a discount or something like that.

And it really is a nice CD (really solid music plus a bunch of art by interrobang and others on a glossy full-color 10-page booklet) and I'm proud of what we managed to put together, but at this point Music has literally a hundred times more content and doesn't require any overhead to either contribute or listen to, so the meficomp is destined I think to be a one-off. At this point, the new Music Podcast I'm doing feels to me like a worthy and more modern successor to the compilation format anyway.
posted by cortex (staff) at 8:49 AM on June 20, 2009

I had a box of those CDs in the trunk of my car for weeks after I visited cortex. Seriously, be careful, he is so dedicated to giving them away, he will start putting them in bags when you aren't looking.

I think if you invest in some sharpie markers and discount stickers, you could stick a bunch in coffee shops, or at the front desk of a record store and see how long it takes for them to get moved at "$10 Free!" prices.
posted by mrzarquon at 11:11 AM on June 20, 2009

Thanks for the explanation, cortex.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 5:54 PM on June 20, 2009

Yeah, I found it a bit hard to catch the bit about the MeFi comp as well, to the point where I rewound the podcast twice (and then checked on MeTa) to make sure I didn't miss the boat on ordering T-shirts.

When are those coming out, anyway?
posted by Phire at 11:44 PM on June 21, 2009